Monkey to Millions | Victor (Session 4) - Detailed LinkedIn Networking Advice and New Focus
About
In this episode, we learn that Victor is working 90hrs a week at two jobs to make sure he can keep up with his bills. We focus on the highest impact tasks he can be doing for under an hour a day to help him build toward a better future - this includes a detailed section on how he should be leveraging LinkedIn and his background to build relationships. Also, an update on his search and looking to California for a job in finance.
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WSO Podcast (Episode 4) Transcript:
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:00:23] Hello and welcome, I'm Patrick Curtis, chief monkey of Wall Street Oasis, and this is monkey to millions. A show where you get a front row seat as I mentor young students and professionals to try and help them break into their dream jobs in the first cohort. You'll meet four students, all preparing for intense job interviews while trying to also balance personal life and schoolwork. The goal of this show is to shine a light on the struggles of trying to break into competitive positions with a non-traditional background and to give you a roadmap for your own success. My hope is that as you get to know these four impressive students, you're inspired to dream big. Remember, these are real people, and this is their true story. Let's get to it. In this episode, We learned that Victor is working over 90 hours a week at two jobs to make sure he can keep up with his bills. We focus on the highest impact tasks he can be doing for under an hour each day to help him build toward a better future. This includes a detailed section on how he should be leveraging LinkedIn and his background to build relationships. Also an update on his search and looking to California for a job in finance. Enjoy. All right. Victor's been a long time. Thanks for coming back. Here it is now April 14th. Twenty one. I was just talking you offline for a little bit. You were giving an update about how your regions have now opened up to California for potential jobs, not just salt Lake City. So that's been a change. You haven't made as much progress as you'd like in terms of the networking and outreach. You've done a little bit of the financial modelling training with excel modelling. And I know now kind of is a better time for you. Some of the personal stuff is getting resolved, and so you're able to kind of start dedicating at least 20 minutes a day. Did I hear that right?
Victor: [00:02:12] Yes. Going forward, I will try to go for 40 minutes, 20 minutes before work and 20 minutes afterwards. That's perfect, but I'm going to be you're working.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:02:20] You're working two jobs right now.
Victor: [00:02:22] Right now, yes, I'm working three jobs.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:02:24] So let's talk a little bit about you had requested that we kind of do a hands on session to show you the power of LinkedIn. Because I harped on LinkedIn last time, I was, you know, pounding the table on how you should be using this to kind of build network, build your network, build connections and relationships. I almost like don't want to call it networking because it can have a bad, bad connotation, too. I like calling it just build relationships using LinkedIn. So I made you a co-host. Let's see if this works with the recording, but why don't you share your screen? And let's just jump into LinkedIn and kind of dive in and we'll try to do one or two of these.
Victor: [00:03:00] Ok, I'm going to go here. And. Let's see.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:03:08] At the bottom, can you see it? The share
Victor: [00:03:11] Screen. Ah, yes, right now. Perfect going, Do you see my LinkedIn screen?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:03:20] I'm there.
Victor: [00:03:21] Ok, perfect. All right.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:03:24] If you go to your home page, go to your profile and then you go to specifically. Um. Let's see here you go to search at the top. Right here, first, go to your profile and my profile right here. Yep. Well, I have four connections I was two for. So two, fifty two, so it's not ideal. As I said, I was trying to still figure it out. I think it's looking on another screen or something.
Victor: [00:03:57] You're OK. Sorry, it's OK.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:00] Ok, here. Let me do my screen and I'll show you and then you just fall along with me. How about that?
Victor: [00:04:05] Ok? Do you see now
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:08] I'm sharing my. Oh yeah, now I see you. Yeah, yeah.
Victor: [00:04:11] Ok, perfect. Do you see it now?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:13] Is this yours or mine? I think this is mine that you're seeing mine.
Victor: [00:04:17] I see yours, I think I'm being a Patrick Skins, yes, yes. Ok, so what I want you to do
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:23] Is follow along with me. So we're looking at let's look at your profile and we have let's choose something about your background where we can try to find some commonality with people. I think the easiest one is navy, OK? Ok, so what I want to do here is go up to search. Up at the top, go search where you go search for. Navy, we're going to say see all results and you can go to filters up here. All filters and we're going to go to our people and we're going to go to all filters. They've changed the up a little bit. Look at that. Ok, so now pass company. U’s Navy. See, that's right.
Victor: [00:05:09] Here I am looking at, yes, current company U.S. Navy.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:05:14] But this company, current company also schools United States Naval Academy.
Victor: [00:05:19] United States Naval Academy, OK, right? Do you see that a second? I have my current company, but there is no company there.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:05:30] Ok, that's fine. That's fine. And then you could do second and third degree connections. And then the other thing I would do is industry, I would do financial services. Ok, OK. And then let's hit show results. Let's see what that generates. No results found. So there's something limiting this. So let's go back to all filters. Let's remove. Oh, can't have current and past in, so let's just do past company U.S. Navy. And let's not. These are and so that's the problem. So we'll do. U.s. Navy Pass Company and financial services second or third. So let's try to show results. Let's see if that works better. There we go. Seven thousand nine hundred results.
Victor: [00:06:14] Oh, OK. Seven hundred and twenty six for me, but let me go back. Ok, but I see what you
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:06:20] Get the idea. You get the idea. Ok, so now we have all these people who are in the U.S. Navy submarine officer, air traffic controller in the Navy, nuclear sub officer. All these people, right? And I say, OK, seven thousand nine hundred. That's a lot of people. Let's actually see how many are in California.
Victor: [00:06:44] So if we go United States and then California on the location.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:06:48] Yeah, well, no. Yeah. Location, just California, United States. So now all of a sudden I’m seeing eight hundred and ninety six. That's a really nice sized that's a really nice sized list. And so you could literally take this list of eight hundred and ninety six people. Ok. And I bet you in a week of work, you could connection requests to all of them with the short one line. So let's say this you'd hit to so you don't need to be picky, right? All these people have either worked in currently work in financial services. Let's take a look at Robbins and Christopher. Ok? The Robbins. He's the CEO of Safe Ride Health. He's in Santa Monica, California. Beautiful location, LA, right? He's been there. He's been there for this many years. He worked at BCG before. He was also in the private equity. So he has the kind of that finance background, right? I see. So you can say something like and he and he also the beauty of this is if you look at his background. You should have something in the Navy. Right here, Nancy. Yes. Student naval aviator for a year in Pensacola, The boom, you immediately have a connection, right? So for these people, what I would want you to do is click on Connect. You don't have to do it from here. Even you can do it from the list. So it's faster, so connect. Add a note. Ok. Hi. Hi, Robin's, you'd say hi, Robin's. And looking to make the transition from. Salt Lake. Thirty to. I'm. California. You even say. to selling our southern. Southern California. And I saw. You have a finance background. Um, and currently. Um, I think my transition from Salt Lake City to something that you have a Chinese background. Like me. And also. Worked in the Navy. I'd love to connect. And stay in touch. Let's connect and chat for. Few minutes, if you could spare the. Spare. At the time. Question mark. Can be that big and look, you still have 50 characters left here.
Victor: [00:09:49] Ok, perfect.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:09:50] I would make it longer, but that's the type of thing I would write. So I was looking for the transition to Salt Lake City did it up. So he was Southern California. You wouldn't say that to the Bay Area guy. You'd say looking a bit to the Bay Area, we're going to make the transition to the Bay area so that you have fineness, background like me and also worked in the Navy. Also worked or served in the Navy. Whatever it is right there in the Navy, blah. Look for chapter three minutes. If you could spare the time and that's humble, it's nice that you literally can send one a minute of that. I want every two minutes so you do the math you're doing. You could do 20 a day, 30 a day. It's going to get you through this list of and just start there. Why even branch out? Just go navy first and go finance financial services California. Boom done. You're going to out of these nine hundred people. If I had to give you an estimate of how many people will actually connect with you and chat with you because the Navy is probably really strong alumni base. My guess is it's going to be upwards of one out of every five. We'll connect with you. Um, maybe a little bit worse, maybe a little bit better, but my guess is probably around one out of five. Over time, it might start out just one out of ten, but it will gradually over time, people will see it. Sometimes they miss it and they'll see it like three months later and they'll connect. But the point is, let's say there's, let's say, rounded up to a thousand people. You have two hundred people connecting with you, right? Yes. And out of those two hundred people, the goal would be to get at least 20 of them on the phone.
Victor: [00:11:19] It OK.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:11:20] Ok, so that's about one 20. That's about two percent, four percent range.
Victor: [00:11:26] Ok, let's get them on the phone. This is the second step, right? So let's talk about that second step.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:11:31] Yeah, let's talk about getting them on the bottle. So if they connect to say, Yeah, great, we'd love the chance to chat any time, then you follow up with great thanks so much for the connection. And you say great, thanks. And if they connected you, by the way, you should have a spreadsheet, open a Google Sheet or something along those lines. You can go here. I'll share my screen and I can show you kind of a we have in the in the social networking course we have, which I think you have. We have a networking template which has all this stuff, but you could also just create one you say name. They initially connected. Acted, you could say source that would just be linked in. Right, you could say email. We say notes something like this, But when you talk to them, so you can say industry. And this will give you steps, and then you can have some conditional formatting on the date initially. Connected, and you could have like follow up. One follow up to. To and with these, you should be using you should definitely be using something like a writing box or a boomerang, so for example, if I compose. And I send an e-mail, so the beauty of once you've connected with somebody. Is that this would be another guy you connect with, but Navy veteran, right? The beauty is If I look at his contact info, oftentimes I can't get his email until you're connected with somebody. But if I look at my network and I choose somebody here randomly connections. And I say, OK. You know, Jeffrey is connected with me if I go to contact info. I have an email, I see. So as soon as they connect with you, get it off of LinkedIn, you won't be responding on LinkedIn, you're going to be bringing it over to email. So once you have that email, the beauty is you go like this? Pretend we'll pretend Jeffrey is one of your targets, so you'll grab his email contact info, right click Cop email. Bring it in here. Boom! Now, even easier than a spreadsheet is literally just having these reminders, with boomerang reminding in two weeks if no reply. Start with one week. Ok. Ok. And I think we had this and you can say thanks or the connection. You say, Geoffrey. Thanks for connecting on LinkedIn. And by the way, you should have a signature that's well thought out, that's with it, Doesn't have to have your photo, but it should have like all of your contact info. Any other stuff you have? Thanks for connecting. You can basically say something like. I'm. I'd love to chat for five to 10 minutes. Um, some time. In the next few weeks. I'm typically available. Any time. and you put it in their time zone, by the way, any time from, you know. Seven a.m. you 10 or whatever it is, seven a.m. to seven, seven a.m. Monday through Friday or, you know, it could be later 4:00 p.m. to eight p.m. ESD.
Victor: [00:15:05] Awesome. I may ask one question there. Yeah, go ahead. How do you put the boomerang? I don't think I've ever worked with it. How do you add that to your email? Sure, you go to here, you
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:15:18] Go to extension. So actually, I here look. Uh, manage extensions in Gmail. And you would just search it here, so I could say, are you going to do add extensions, extensions, attentions to Chrome? Chrome extension, oops, no, not that one. Support, install, manage extensions. Chrome Web store type in right here would be boomerang. I actually prefer right inbox to boomerang because it allows you to do other stuff, but Boomerang is fine, writing box has actually been down for me and it's driving me insane. The last few days I've had to switch to Boomerang. But here's the beauty. Here's the beauty. If you get boomerang, it allows. You put the one week reminder on it if there's no reply. The beauty. Is if you go under. Let me show you this. You go under settings here, OK? In your Gmail. You go under advanced. Right here. Yes. And you hit templates enable. Ok. Ok. When I write this, thanks for the connection. Template, blah, blah, you know, available to me any time, any time between. Between 7:00 p.m. or 4:00 p.m., eight p.m. or even just do 10 p.m. show you're willing to stay up late Monday through Friday, whenever is best for you. And you could say something like. Is there? I'd love to learn. To learn more about your start at XYZ. Company. Um, as well as how you made the transition to Abs. Ok. Yeah, Internet best regards. victor? Ok, perfect. Ok. Yes. What you do here now is you have the reminder already set right here. But here in the bottom right hand corner because of enabled the templates, more options templates. Save draft as template. Davies new template. So this is going to be thanks for the connection. LinkedIn.
Victor: [00:18:05] Right.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:18:05] Awesome, save now. Next time I'm starting to compose, I don't have to start over, I just go down to these bottom paying templates. Thanks for the connection, boom. Awesome. I have to remove my double signature, but besides that, I just say that a Geoffrey Tom. Thanks for the cash, a lot of chapter members, really, but now I've set up the reminder again one week. Send it next in a week when they haven't responded, which guess what? It'll be a lot of them. You said another one and it's a shorter one. You can say, let's pretend. Let's pretend this is bounced. This has come back to you. And then you basically can say. Well, we'll pretend Jeffrey again.
Victor: [00:18:52] And this is after a week or two weeks,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:18:55] I would say one week initially, Ok, you can be a little more aggressive If they don't respond after that one, I'll show you said. So let's say if this is the pretend this is the first week, then I will out. What I would do is do a month. So you go hit them once, hit them again a week later. If there's nothing. Wait a month, OK? So you go, Jeffrey. Just bumping this thread up. I'm. I'm sure you are super busy. X y z. Company. Oh, no worries. If you can't chat, But if you can spare the time I'm available. Most mornings. All mornings and evenings. Text. Or call at cell number.
Victor: [00:20:03] I see.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:20:04] Ok, so just make it an easier thing where they can just maybe text you right there be like, Hey, I have five minutes right now. Can you chat? And you can try to jump out of your work and just get a phone call going? It's going to be really awkward the first few times you do these calls. But guess what, after like the after the tenth one, you're going to start feeling more comfortable. It's just like an interview, right? It's actually going to make you a better interviewer. It's going to polish these skills. Ok, so
Victor: [00:20:25] Maybe we go to third one, let's say it. But again, what
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:20:29] Do we bump? This is pretend. Now you've sent him an email. The first email, an email week later, an email a month later.
Victor: [00:20:36] Ok. Ok.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:20:38] And so you want to know what the email? The month later says?
Victor: [00:20:40] Yes. I'm guessing we're trying to be like a little more kind of shorter, but
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:20:46] I won't bother you again.
Victor: [00:20:48] You OK again?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:20:50] But just wanted to make sure you saw this. If it's easier, you could even do a calendar link. Ok. My calendar, Lee. Link is here to book. Time, it sounds a little presumptuous, I don't know if you want to go that way, but you kind of have little to lose and you're making it potentially easier for some people might just go click, click. Yeah. You might also want to put a County Link in your signature so that if they want to do it that way, you just have something like Book of Time to chat there in the signature. It can look a little sales, so I wouldn't really emphasize it initially. I want it to be more personal. I don't want you to be like here, book of Time to check it and you look like you're a sales guy. Yes. Right? Yes. Yes. Instead of won't bother you again, just want to make sure you saw this. I won't bother you again. Just wanted to reach out one last time. Time, if these are my can link, is. Is here and then is here, I would link it there. Um, to book a time. Wise, I'm happy to call. You whenever. As best to convenient for you, something like that, right?
Victor: [00:22:12] I see. Yeah. And how do I get the calendar week? Sorry, is that I have to download calendar?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:22:18] Yeah, you just it's an easy, free thing, Counly. You just create your own calendar, you should sync it up to your Gmail calendar. Ok? And you should keep that calendar when you're working and you know you can't be on the phone, you should block off those times. I see. Are you on vacation? You can't talk that week. Block off those times. You're going to use this, but you can have a recurring schedule and open slots like 10 minute and you can make them make them 10 minute slots. So it's very low, low ask, right? So you get them on the phone and then your phone calls, some of them will be you just have a gap of 20 minutes in between when people are allowed to book, so you don't get to 10 minute calls right next to each other. You can have a 10 minute call, but there's a 20 minute gap. So if it does go 30 minutes, you're OK, Ok to take the next call. You can even you know what I mean? You can even do forty five minute gaps. You're not going to need that many slots because you're not going to get that many calls initially.
Victor: [00:23:09] Yes, of course. Of course. Understandable. Two questions there. This is going to be the last one, right? And if it doesn't or whoever he or she says,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:23:16] Oh no, no, no, then I'm going to put a year. I put a reminder out here for a year one, but the year one can be a little bit different. Jeffrey, I know we never got a chance to connect. Last year, but I thought. I would reach out. Um, to give you an update and update, you can say I've made the transition to California. You can say at this point, I've been applying for these types of roles and I'm in final rounds here. At this point, what you want to do in a year is a long time you may want to do six months. Six months can get a little bit. They could be a little bit annoying. Especially said, as you said, it's the last time I'll reach out to you.
Victor: [00:23:58] Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's what I was wondering.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:24:00] Yeah, but a year's OK, a year, you're just kind of pinging im updating it and they'll be like, Wow, this guy doesn't give up. And the beauty of that is in this like long dated email. Where they haven't responded to you. You haven't taken that as a no. You haven't taken that as a rejection. You're still positive. You're still humble. And more importantly, you're showing progress. You could even say in the third email after a month, be like, I'm looking to learn more about that. You can say, you know, I really admired your transition from here to here. And so, you know, I'm looking to do something similar. I've managed to get into final rounds or I've managed it to just give a little update. So you can have that's like a that's like an that's a personal update for yourself of like, what's the latest thing? And then just relate it to what they've done. Ok.
Victor: [00:24:47] And relate to that, what they've done. Ok.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:24:49] And this you don't have to this, you don't have to even have a template for it yet because they're so far. I see. I see. Yeah. But the more important thing is that. You don't just give up.
Victor: [00:24:58] Yeah, of course, yeah.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:25:00] These are leads you can. These are people who connected with you. Yes. LinkedIn so they're it's probably they got too busy. They just said, I Victor. I don't have time for right now, so they just ignored you. So like, I think letting it go is a mistake. I think the fourth time with nothing is kind of it's kind of funny. It's kind of silly, but it's a year later or even nine months later, it's kind of like, Wow, oh, I forgot about that guy. And then maybe they're in a better spot at that point where they're not in the middle of the deal and they could talk with you. And more importantly, it shows that you're moving forward, it's not like you're like bettering yourself and you're and people like to help people who are showing signs of progress and all that stuff,
Victor: [00:25:35] Right?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:25:37] Ok, so I would and then. You know, after that, if they don't respond after the nine month or the one year, you know thing, I think after that, sure, you can probably let it go.
Victor: [00:25:48] I see. Ok, perfect. The second question, let's say they got on the phone. I got lucky.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:25:53] I mean, honestly, honestly, even after the one year, if they don't respond, I would put another reminder. Another year later, OK, say, Hey, I've moved to California. I'm now an investment banking analyst and you start showing traction. Eventually, they're going to be like, Wow, you're still. Why do you keep and you all get some people be like, Stop updating me about your life like every year. But what happens if you've built up a list of like three hundred people where you're updating them on your life and your transitions, and you're only doing a once a year and it's a short email? And you keep saying nice stuff about them and oh, I saw you transition to here. Congrats, and you're actually doing that. It's a lot of work, But you're going to know so many people and you're going to hear about so many more opportunities. Oh, Victor, so sorry. Never had a chance to respond before. Let's hop up to Chad. I actually. Oh, you're at XYZ Bank? I know there's new opening here.
Victor: [00:26:41] Boom. I see.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:26:42] I see only takes one of those to suddenly make the whole thing worth it.
Victor: [00:26:46] I see. I see. No perfect. I'm really actually very excited about this because course, you never give up a second out of three hundred five of them. Even two of them gives you some kind of day life that, Hey, I know someone who works there. Do you want to give it a try? And it is a door open. You might as well.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:27:04] Yeah. And so I think what's going to be important for you is to simplify your number one, simplify your story, OK? Because your story is complicated, like, Oh, I was Azerbaijan, and then I did this, and then they came here, and that was me. Now I'm in Salt Lake City. It's, you know, and then like, now you're like, I'm moving back to California. They'll be like, What's going on? Right? So I think I think we should talk a little bit about how you frame yourself and you know, you shouldn't say your age. Yes, because there is ageism, especially if you're trying to break in early, you're older, so don't offer that information, you can just say, Hey, I'm a recent graduate of Georgetown. Period. Like, you know what I mean, and so like, there's navy is one path, the other path that you could initially hit and you could actually see which is getting a better response. Maybe you do one hundred one week for the Navy and you do one hundred for Georgetown alone. I see in California.
Victor: [00:27:58] Ok. And Patrick, I wrote the question about the age. One may look at my Navy career that have been almost 10 years and within that kind of figured out that this guy is kind of older than an actual twenty one twenty two year old.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:28:12] Yeah, but why offer that information?
Victor: [00:28:14] Yeah, of course. But they will kind of figure
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:28:16] You could see it. But I mean, the reality is, you just graduated undergrad in 2019. It's not that long ago. Ok. All right. Ok. So I think the hard part is going to be number one, you don't really have the hard skills. Your or your not so banks are going to look at you sideways being like, well, are you an associate or are you an analyst?
Victor: [00:28:38] Yeah.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:28:39] Number one number two is like, if you're I mean, I don't even know, I still don't even know what you really want. And so like, that's a huge just it's a huge red flag of like anybody talking to you or chatting with you if they want to help. If you can't like succinctly say, like, I want to do this and it would be helpful for us in terms of our search. If you are like, I know I want to be an investment banking analyst, you said that's what I want to be. It would make my life. It would make your networking outreach much. You can narrow it. You could get much more focused. You could do all Georgetown alum in California that work in investment banking or have previously worked in mass banking. You could do all Navy alumni work in investment banking anywhere in the country. You could do all these things. Does that make sense?
Victor: [00:29:20] Yes, it does. It does.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:29:22] So like and maybe it's not an investment banking, maybe it's equity research. Maybe it's asset management. Maybe it's. Sales and trading. You know what I mean, there's lots of different things in debt capital markets, ECM, because you know, your training is focused on capital markets, so I see that makes sense. Yes, it does.
Victor: [00:29:42] Can we talk about highlights? Let's say I got on the phone. They have five minutes and 10 minutes, and I know that I'm there to kind of collect information. What happens next? How do I go kind of structured that conversation?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:29:55] I want you to talk about as much, talk about them as much as possible. Ok.
Victor: [00:30:00] Now they're basically their story, their position, how they get there, how they transition.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:30:04] Yeah. So for example, let's pretend we're talking to Jeffrey. Yes, in at Moorgate Capital Partners. So Jeffrey would say, Yeah, I saw you graduate in twenty twelve and then like you, mate, you immediately jumped into the best banking. At Moorgate, let's pretend to invest in banking and you've been there like for such a long run. Have you ever? This is kind of a bad example because literally been one company is in. But like, you know, if he had jumped around a few things we like, I noticed you started out here and then you jumped after a few years to there. Can you talk to me about that transition or how did you even end up breaking in? Obviously, Penn Wharton is a great school. So like, was this something you always knew you wanted to do? And you know? I think the more specific you can get about your questions. Rather than, you know, I noticed that you guys are a relatively small merchant bank, so this is like the perfect type of place to target because it's like 11 to 50 employees. They're looking, they're sometimes looking for non-traditional candidates. And if you can see my.
Victor: [00:31:06] I do I do see it.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:31:09] Right, so they have like literally no analysts at least mentioned here. Um, and I don't know, let's see people. Um. But yeah, they run really lean, right? Yeah, so, you know, you can ask them about the decision to like work there since he's graduated and like what's kept in there? Obviously, you know, he's going to say all the money, but you know, You could just ask him like, you know, have you thought about, you know, I notice, like a lot of people are jumping or you could you don't want to, You know, want to make him get defensive, but just ask him, like, You know, if he had any advice for you what it would be given that he's had such a successful track record, you know, up at Moorgate. Does he feel like somebody with your background like you can ask him, like, I have been trained, you know, I have this apprenticeship at Goldman, but you know, I've been in the Navy for so long. You know, a little bit older candidate. Do you think you know what type of firms I should be targeting that would be open to like looking at non-traditional candidates or anything like that, like small boutiques? There's also, Victor, probably some programs. Nbc Wall Street veteran. Programs. Veterans on Wall Street, is that what you're doing?
Victor: [00:32:32] Yes. No, the one I'm doing right now. It's veteran integration at Goldman Sachs.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:32:39] Ok. Have you looked at these GI jobs, top programs for veterans in the finance industry? Have five companies that want to hire vets now we looked at this, so like you should be looking at like Wall Street Finance veterans programs should be doing these Google searches, OK and looking for people that want. Jp Morgan has one. Ok. You should be joining every single one of these and using those to network. Ok. But, you know, I think you're going to struggle until you no one build a skills and then have the confidence to back it up and talk about specifically what you want. So if you're like doing the financial modelling training, so we give you access to all that financial modeling.
Victor: [00:33:18] Yes. Yes. If you're if you're
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:33:21] Actually putting in time there. Let's develop the skills you start feeling more confident you're like, actually, I think I want to do the most in banking analyst enter, if you're like, Hey, I want to do a couple of years, then go to business school or what have you, You're going to. Be able to narrow things much faster and you're going be able to like it's going to be.
Victor: [00:33:40] Yeah. Can we talk about that because of the skills proportional? Because obviously, they're going to have to if they're going to hire me. I have to show that I can do the work. And you guys gave me very generously. So appreciate the courses I studied with Excel, I'm going to follow up with what she told me. So based on, I write it down based on the amount that I need to spend. It's going to take a hundred and fifty two hundred hours, which gives me around four to six months to kind of learn and master the seven, eighty percent, the material. So that kind of gets me to look September-October realistically, And this is put in about 30 minutes a day, kind of based on my
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:34:18] Own. Yeah, I mean, I wish I could get to tell you, tell you like you're working full time, which is hard, right? Yes.
Victor: [00:34:24] Like you
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:34:24] Could. You could literally do this. Guess what it aims at making analyst work one hundred hours and one week? Yeah.
Victor: [00:34:30] Yeah, yeah. Of course, of course, of course.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:34:32] So like, I don't know, Ambassador Banking's for you, if you're going to only put in 20 30 minutes and you're not going to work all weekend doing this and plowing through these courses, do you know what I mean? Like, it's just the lifestyle is horrible. It's really, really bad.
Victor: [00:34:44] It was more than a whole lifestyle. It's more like a location based. Is it going to be like a Los Angeles based investment banking? Is it going to be the same? Because there's less,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:34:53] But there is SF. There's Bay Area. Yeah, I see. Yeah, there are some out there, OK? But like, you know, either way, the skills you're learning through these financial modeling courses, they're applicable to a lot of other things too, and they look good.
Victor: [00:35:07] That is that that's the thing that I want to get to like. What else I can apply to
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:35:11] Corporate finance transaction advisory services at the big four. I would be really good. That would be a really good career. Ok. They work hard. They get paid a little bit less. They work, they still work hard. But that can be used as a stepping stone as a transition before going to banking. I see. What about start ups? Startups are totally mixed bag, but you could be. Turns out, late stage, early stage startups, I would probably say stay away from its super high risk. You're not going, you're going to get low cash pay and have high potential upside. Um. But I don't know even know what they would bring you in, as I think you don't really have enough experience, like if you had done a few years of mess banking. Let me put it this way you've done a few years investment banking. Everybody wants you. I see. You know why? Because you only cost one hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year. Yet you have the skills of like a CFO because you've been in two years. You've worked about the equivalent of four years and you have the stamp of approval from the banks that have vetted, vetted you and put you through crazy boot camps. I see. But that's like that's why. That's why, like banking is so popular, it's not because people want to suffer and work those crazy hours is because the exit opportunities that banking provides are really amazing. I can't tell you every single company that comes to me had this company and there's a job in San Francisco, they said, we want somebody with two to four years of investment banking experience, and I said, Well, how much are you willing to pay? And they said one hundred and hundred thousand base, 50 percent bonus. And I laughed and like, you guys are like, You're going to be very hard. Yeah, I'm like to be very hard. You're not going to get them because they have private equity offers, paying them one hundred and one hundred, you know, two hundred thousand, you know, right out of the gate. Why are they going to go work for this and all this, you know, blah like, OK, you know, the good news is they had new fund raising, so there's potentially some carry and they were doing other stuff. So there is potentially the right person for it that maybe miss the private equity recruiting process. But this is like, this is the struggle for you. You're already very non-traditional. You have other stuff going on where you have to work full time. Like for you to get into any sort of track that's going to be. Or people are going to be confident of like hiring you. You had to like, no, you have to be like ready to talk the talk, walk, the walk. It'll come from a little bit from training in the courses, but it's you can't like replicate two years of working in Excel. All right. Of course, like one hundred hours is not even close. That's one week as a banker. And they did one hundred weeks of that.
Victor: [00:37:50] I see. Yes.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:37:52] So even after the training of you saying it's taking until September, even after that training, you've done one percent of what investment banking analyst has done.
Victor: [00:37:58] So that's what I'm kind of, You know, I appreciate your mentoring me through and that's
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:38:04] Just as honest, right?
Victor: [00:38:05] That's just I know, I know. Of course, that's what I need. But the question is then comes that I take basically anything that comes my way if I get London any kind of job and keep building the skills, paying, paying what I mean in the banking area, advisory anything that even, let's say, a shop with like six or seven people and they pay a lot less than investment banking for California, for example, one hundred eight hundred and twenty thousand, but they're paying like seven and eighty thousand or in Salt Lake. So that would be a great I should take that to kind of build up that skill. And that's what I was trying
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:38:39] To do deals just to do deals. And the beauty of that is even if they you almost don't want them to call you an associate or B because you're eight, you almost want to be tagged as an analyst. I know, Because coming out of that experience, you can transition to either a better shop the lateral opportunities, like if you have one year of experience on your resume with a few deals, even if it's at a small, small no-name bank or whatever. But you have some deal flow there and you've closed some deals, you're going to able to transition to like a very strong middle market, shop a lateral like and then get more deals, and then from there potentially even get to private equity. I see, I see.
Victor: [00:39:15] So that's the game on them for me to finish the courses I do the LinkedIn
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:39:22] And LinkedIn courses
Victor: [00:39:24] And the courses and try to kind of get my foot in any kind of no-name bag, anything that here in Accra or an
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:39:31] Unnamed bank or like, you know, start there and see if you get any bites, if you're able. I mean, the problem is, you know, you're doing the fun, you're doing the financial modeling, skill training to try and build that confidence and feel good about your skills issues. If you're not training for the interviews too, it's going to be hard. So like, I don't even know if I would. If you're only doing that much, if you're only going to be able to put in an hour a day realistically and you're committing to that. I think the networking for sure, because that's just going to open doors for you, that would never be there. But then I'm thinking, like, is it better if you actually spend time on it? Best making interview prep. And you have the invest making interview course. Yes, I do. I think it might be better. I mean, how strong is you like your accounting background and your financial statement modeling and stuff like that?
Victor: [00:40:21] Well, financial model taking the courses. But I did a bunch of accounting courses when I was in college. You did OK. I am pretty sure I'm a bit rusty, but I have like a basics down. It should not be hard to kind Of. Ok, great. So I'm going to give myself up a whole summer. Just go through the whole interview thing. I'm going to do 20 to 40 minutes of a LinkedIn, and once I get it down, it should be easy. And then 20 to 40 minutes of the courses a day, do
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:40:50] That and only do that, OK? And I would also actually do it.
Victor: [00:40:54] No, no, no, no. But I like I said, because of personal stuff that was going on.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:40:59] I know, I know I'm giving you shit. I know I'm giving you shit, but I just want to make sure because I think just starting a little bit every day and committing to a little bit every day, that's realistic. Yeah, it's so much better than just saying, Oh, I'm going to spend two hours a day, one hour in the morning when I can.
Victor: [00:41:13] That's what I have to be. I can't do two hours. That would be a lie and that would be excluded.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:41:18] So, yeah, so you know, you're working two jobs. So let's do something small. And guess what, when you start seeing momentum, you're probably going to end up doing more anyways.
Victor: [00:41:26] Okay, perfect. That's what I remember, because you'll get excited. That's what the lady I was talking about at the beginning. She told me the same thing. Yeah, she told me the same thing that don't know.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:41:36] But just make sure that you do it.
Victor: [00:41:38] You do it every day. Yeah, OK, because I want to show you something like, I have it here, so I just got back. So this is my calendar. I'm going to put it here and I'm going to put the cup cross marks. So I have also in the bathroom mirror so I can go to sleep if I didn't put the 20 minutes. Yeah, so I'll make sure that
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:41:56] I'm going to make you. I'm going to make you show me that calendar next time. Ok, I want to see all the pluses, OK? And I want to see the two hundred and fifty two connections. I want to see that be much higher.
Victor: [00:42:04] Ok, it's a month from now, right? Yeah, OK. Talking about perfect. Thank you so much about you. Yeah.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:42:09] Anything else like questions? I mean, if you end up getting on the phone with people? Yeah. Just be curious, intellectually curious and really be curious about what they do and try to understand what they do day to day. And that you're going to be fine with that, like you can just tell them, sorry, I'm just learning, you know, I'm just getting more knowledgeable on all this stuff. I'm trying to make the transition out there. But like I know right now, given that I only have the apprenticeship Goldman under my belt, I'm obviously, you know, I'm just still learning. You know, we've done a rotation in capital markets. So like training, focus on capital markets. If somebody starts quizzing you on capital markets, how comfortable are you?
Victor: [00:42:48] Not very comfortable. Right. So, yes, I'm being honest with you, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's I would say, yeah, I got it, know I, but I'm going to definitely
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:43:00] 40 hours a week. Are you working at the two jobs?
Victor: [00:43:03] About ninety five,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:43:05] You're working ninety five hours a week. On the weekends, too.
Victor: [00:43:10] Yes. But I have early morning going to have a night time. How much are they paying you? Oh, be honest. It's about an hour and 20 bucks an. 13 and 16. Ok.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:43:23] The thirteen dollars an hour. Is it more hours per week?
Victor: [00:43:26] Yes.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:43:30] How many hours is the $13 an hour?
Victor: [00:43:33] That's close to six to five. Oh, it's a lot.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:43:36] Yeah. So and you're doing that because of everything else going on, you need that money.
Victor: [00:43:40] Yes, yes. Ok, I need it, but I need to buy a car as soon as possible. So while your cards are meant to break down, right, oh, it's like it's really price, you know? So let me go it.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:43:52] Yeah, your debt is low, though, Which is good. Oh yeah.
Victor: [00:43:56] Yeah, yeah. Cruise credit score. Everything is perfect. I just want to make sure that I don't have issue with that. Ok.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:44:03] Yeah. If you're working 90 hours a week, I can see why you're only committing to 20.
Victor: [00:44:07] Yeah, I just wanted to be honest. You know, it's just not possible, but improbable. I would say I would not get most out of it.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:44:13] Are your parents where your parents live?
Victor: [00:44:16] My dad passed away last year and my brother. Thank you. My mom and dad live overseas, so I barely see them.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:44:26] Um, if you were to move to California without a job or a low paying job, would you be able to find a room that you could rent? That's much. Yes, yes. Yes. What's your rent right now?
Victor: [00:44:40] Oh, right now I'm paying with the bills on everything.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:44:44] So I'm wondering if California is not cheap?
Victor: [00:44:47] Fortunately, I have friends. I can kind of crash on their couch and be in the living room, paying them six seven hundred dollars.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:44:55] Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. They might be able to save you, but you know, you'd have to find something that pays you 16, 17, 18 bucks an hour and at least working 40 hours a week, right? Yes. But then that would open up so much time for you. Yeah. More damage with this stuff.
Victor: [00:45:11] Yeah. And also like our mental health and climate and everything, you know that that would be much, much better.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:45:18] You know, living on somebody's couch is not ideal. Living in a closet, living in an apartment where the room that's tiny is fine.
Victor: [00:45:25] But I think I can't find something like I can talk to people about buying something that get one bedroom and work there, but for that for idea, because if you can move like there's a huge advantage to being in the area and being able to meet people, I
Victor: [00:45:38] See face to face,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:45:39] Right? And by the way, San Francisco being in the city right now is probably the cheapest it's ever been in, like 20 years. I see. So there might be a room, so there might be a room that you could get for really cheap. I see, like just a room somewhere. They lost it. They lost their roommate, whatever. And that might be a good move for you. Get out of that lease that you're in and just make the move so you can start networking. I mean, I think S.F. is going to be better for you in terms of opportunities, I see. And then that way, but you're going to have to find that job first, right? Like, yeah, like that's that can be the bridge. Yes, in my question, what about the navy? And like, what happened to them? Because there are they paying you?
Victor: [00:46:17] It's going to be a reserve, and I do that once a month. Saturday, Sunday, I have to kind of coordinate. I have basically three jobs, so.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:46:24] So yeah, on that. What do you do? You have to fly back?
Victor: [00:46:27] Oh no, no, no. I'm going to just switch find a unit there in California.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:46:31] Ok, perfect. I didn't know you could do that. So OK. I'm just trying to piece it together like time is really valuable I know I know time is what you're using to kind of pay the bills and stuff like that. You're just working these lower wage jobs to pay the bills. And I get it. I'm just wondering, is there like an arbitrage opportunity to help you kind of get to the location you're trying to get to now cover almost what you're doing, but free up a 20 hours a week if you're willing if you're working 90 hours, but you're able to cut your actual working hours down to 60 but have an $18 an hour job or you're basically making the
Victor: [00:47:05] Same, right? You said yes,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:47:07] You're working 60 hours at 18 dollars an hour. You have 20 hours now to do damage. Big difference, man. I see. And that's going to get you somewhere much faster, much, much faster. I see.
Victor: [00:47:21] I definitely I'm going to start looking at starting like a job because I got to first get the personal stuff. Of course you and but that makes that's a good
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:47:29] Plan for potentially this summer to think of. Yes. So don't lie. Did you sign a long term lease? How long
Victor: [00:47:34] Is your? No, not till July. It's almost six.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:47:37] Yeah, that's perfect. I think you should make the I think you should make a plan to make them move either way. Yeah. So Hopefully with COVID. Restaurants could be very busy. Yeah. Anything we can
Victor: [00:47:50] See, we can
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:47:51] Say they pay, they pay well in San Francisco because it's so expensive to live there. If you can just somehow find the cheapest room in San Francisco and then get the job that pays 18 20 bucks an hour and has a lot of hours, you can be in good shape.
Victor: [00:48:05] I will. I will try to look back and look for people that I know and see that if they can find a job first, because I don't want to go without a job and I know that I can put my stuff. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. And I'm going to keep you. Keep you.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:48:23] Yeah. And I think we're on the calendar for when in a month,
Victor: [00:48:27] I would think, yeah, may 14th of may love it. Whatever that was is perfect. All right. Awesome. Thank you. So, so much. Better talk to you. Thanks, bye.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:48:34] And thanks to you, my listeners at Wall Street Oasis. If you have any suggestions whatsoever, please don't hesitate to send them my way. Patrick at Wall Street Oasis dot com. And till next time.
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